San Francisco Photo Safari
I had a fantastic time on my three-day photo viewing safari visit to San Francisco last weekend. I arrived on Saturday afternoon in time to visit some galleries before they closed. My first stop was at 49 Geary which held a number of interesting exhibits. My first stop was the Robert Koch Gallery with an exhibition of prints by Yamamoto Masao. I then headed down to the Modernbook Gallery to view Floating World by Brigitte Carnochan, a display of beautiful warmtone pigment prints on handmade Kozo paper. I also got a chance to look at their newly-published book of works by Jerry Uelsmann. The Fraenkel Gallery was showing Boulevard by Katy Grannan, which consisted of large color portrait of anonymous passers-by taken outdoors in bright sunlight outdoors against stark white walls in LA and San Francisco. My final stop at 49 Geary was the Scott Nichols Gallery to see An Aerial Aesthetic by William Garnett. I then head over to Gallery 291, which was unfortunately between shows, but I did get a chance to see some prints by Beth Moon. I then walked down to RayKo Photo Center for a look at the Last Kodachrome Show.
After an early stop for dim sum on Sunday, I headed to SFMOMA to view the Henri Cartier-Bresson exhibition The Modern Century, which runs through January 30. This was the main reason for my visit and I was not disappointed. I spent over three hours wandering though the thematically arranged room that display nearly 300 of his prints, from the iconic to the obscure. It was interesting to see the difference between the early work, printed in the 30’s by Cartier-Bresson, with the richly-tone but low contrast work printed by Pictorial Services in the 40’s, and the higher contrast work they produced in later years. The evolution of his style and subject matter was also nicely revealed in the exhibition. I’ve always enjoyed Cartier-Bresson’s portrait work, and it was delightful to see prints of Henri Matisse, Martine Franck and John Huston.
Even after the Henri Cartier-Bresson exhibition closes, there is good reason to visit SFMOMA, namely the show Exposed - Voyeurism, Surveillance, and the Camera Since 1870, co-organized by SFMOMA and Tate Modern, which runs through April 17, 2011. This exhibition contains over 200 photographs and is organized around five themes (The Unseen Photographer, Voyeurism and Desire, Celebrity and the Public Gaze, Witnessing Violence, and Witnessing Violence) and includes work by Brassaï, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Walker Evans, Paul Strand, Weegee and many other. There are also several video presentations, including a 45 minute slide show The Ballad of Sexual Dependency by Nan Goldin. I found this exhibition to be even more compelling than the Cartier-Bresson show, and the four hours I spent viewing it were not sufficient to assimilate everything.
My visit to SFMOMA ended with a trip to the gift shop, where excellent catalogs of both exhibits were available. As I left the museum, I thought that nothing could top the last two days of photographic viewing. Little did I know what was in store for me the following day - a visit to Pier 24.
After an early stop for dim sum on Sunday, I headed to SFMOMA to view the Henri Cartier-Bresson exhibition The Modern Century, which runs through January 30. This was the main reason for my visit and I was not disappointed. I spent over three hours wandering though the thematically arranged room that display nearly 300 of his prints, from the iconic to the obscure. It was interesting to see the difference between the early work, printed in the 30’s by Cartier-Bresson, with the richly-tone but low contrast work printed by Pictorial Services in the 40’s, and the higher contrast work they produced in later years. The evolution of his style and subject matter was also nicely revealed in the exhibition. I’ve always enjoyed Cartier-Bresson’s portrait work, and it was delightful to see prints of Henri Matisse, Martine Franck and John Huston.
Even after the Henri Cartier-Bresson exhibition closes, there is good reason to visit SFMOMA, namely the show Exposed - Voyeurism, Surveillance, and the Camera Since 1870, co-organized by SFMOMA and Tate Modern, which runs through April 17, 2011. This exhibition contains over 200 photographs and is organized around five themes (The Unseen Photographer, Voyeurism and Desire, Celebrity and the Public Gaze, Witnessing Violence, and Witnessing Violence) and includes work by Brassaï, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Walker Evans, Paul Strand, Weegee and many other. There are also several video presentations, including a 45 minute slide show The Ballad of Sexual Dependency by Nan Goldin. I found this exhibition to be even more compelling than the Cartier-Bresson show, and the four hours I spent viewing it were not sufficient to assimilate everything.
My visit to SFMOMA ended with a trip to the gift shop, where excellent catalogs of both exhibits were available. As I left the museum, I thought that nothing could top the last two days of photographic viewing. Little did I know what was in store for me the following day - a visit to Pier 24.
posted by Stan Raucher at
11:52 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home